Crankwalk explores Alaska in general

Wow, I can't believe fall is done there.  Still in the 80's here, a few leaves starting to change.  Peak here is probably November, haha.

sethmeister4 said:

Wow, I can't believe fall is done there.  Still in the 80's here, a few leaves starting to change.  Peak here is probably November, haha.

Yeah that's what I was used to as a kid but the seasons take some adjusting to get used to here. What you think of as Spring and Fall are both just a few weeks long. By Halloween, whatever snow on the ground is usually staying until late April. At this point, since summer is over I am ready for it just to be December so I can go skiing.

So pretty! Can't wait for snow 

I said I wasn't going to do another winter on mud terrains so last summer I bought a set of zero mile Hankook studs. 235/75/15s.

Holy crap, with the lift these are going to look tiny.

Like really really tiny!

Whose truck is this? I don't even recognize it with these baby meats on it. Ha!

So I have driven it for a month in the snow now and I love it. Though it looks goofy , in 4wd it can take on any icy road and steep hills. Given that we go skiing a lot, it was always pretty silly that my wife's Prius on studs was way better at getting to the top of the mountain on the paved roads than the Cruiser on 35s. This changes that and now that we have the actual space in the back to put all of our stuff to ski, we have been doing it more.

The engine is still just burning too much oil. My wife can walk to work so Ive been taking her car in the meantime most days for my commute and saving the Cruiser for the weekends. I'm focusing on getting the new motor put together and hopefully swapped in for 2018.

Happy Thanksgiving GRM!

As a fellow displaced Atlantan, I'm loving the license plate.

Man you guys are living the dream. Please keep updating this thread, even if you aren't working on the truck. If I ever decide to move out of Georgia, making the leap to somewhere really, really different like that would be cool.

Does it get better than that photo right there?  No, no it doesn't.  

Excellent thread. I hope to take my 80 up to Alaska via the Marine highway after I finish building it up. What time of year would you recommend visiting?

Also I'm jealous of your fuel mileage, I'm getting about 13. 

bgkast said:

Excellent thread. I hope to take my 80 up to Alaska via the Marine highway after I finish building it up. What time of year would you recommend visiting?

 

Also I'm jealous of your fuel mileage, I'm getting about 13. 

If you are only going to do it once I'd recommend January or July. White or green. Spring and fall are still pretty but those two months you get the full effect. If you take the ferry to southcentral to Whittier or Homer let me know and I'll buy you a beer.

Regarding fuel mileage, 13 mpg in an 80 is about par for the course. That what I was at with my 80 with a 3fe and an automatic. The manual transmission and part-time 4wd in the 60 helps a good bit. A 4 to 5 speed swap would be even better. And a diesel swap while we are at it would be even better than that!

Thanks. January sounds like the time to avoid the mosquitoes. 

yes...love the license plate, and the travel pics.

so you had the cabin (2 hours from work/city?) and nothing else until you got the place in the city?  An apartment?

onemanarmy said:

yes...love the license plate, and the travel pics.

so you had the cabin (2 hours from work/city?) and nothing else until you got the place in the city?  An apartment?

Hey there. No we have always kept a place in Anchorage as well but nothing ever had a real garage until this last place. 

The engine is swapped in the Cruiser and more shenanigans shall be had soon.

The 60 lives with it's new engine and it's ready for more exploring.

You can see more about the new engine here .

Here's a couple photos from earlier in the winter when we were taking the Prius as far as it could go.

Yard moose:

Caravan at the gas station in Willow:

Byron Glacier in Portage:

Out with the old...

And in with the new.  

That brings us to this weekend. 160 miles round trip to Hatcher Pass to  get everything nice and hot. Plenty of mountain passes and long hills down to coast in gear and get some engine braking in.

At the old 4th Ave theatre in downtown Anchorage. The Iditarod dog race will start right here in 2 weeks.

Deep snow up but the studs grabbed nicely. So much better than the mud terrains for this kind of stuff if you're going to run a dedicated winter tire.

All the abandoned mancamps at Independence Mine are now turned in to a historic area but you can still ski around and explore.

I do think it needs a little more enrichment when up at temp which might be the carb or the electric fuel pump can't put out quite the fuel this thing needs. I still get a little drip on on the floor after I pull it in and honestly I can't tell yet if it's PS or oil. Both fluids are so new and light amber colored and right up front. I'm just going to drain the PS and fill it up with bright red ATF just to be able to tell the difference.

Regardless, even with the small teething issues from getting the new engine sorted, I'm glad that I was able to pull off the rebuild and reinstall before it crept in to Spring and Summer. Since I have tomorrow off, I might tinker with it some more in the morning but overall I'm pretty damn happy with it.

Looks like a lot of fun. We took moved from the east to the west, although we went to Arizona rather than Alaska. It's funny how many people we meet who are from Alaska, probably because the desert of Arizona is the complete opposite of the snow and darkness of Alaska. 

That being said, the wide open spaces of either place certainly provide tons of adventures. 

I'm curious, how are your storing your vehicles back in Georgia? Do you own a garage or keep them with family?

pheller said:

Looks like a lot of fun. We took moved from the east to the west, although we went to Arizona rather than Alaska. It's funny how many people we meet who are from Alaska, probably because the desert of Arizona is the complete opposite of the snow and darkness of Alaska. 

That being said, the wide open spaces of either place certainly provide tons of adventures. 

I'm curious, how are your storing your vehicles back in Georgia? Do you own a garage or keep them with family?

There are a ton of snowbirds up here that have winter homes in AZ and HI. So a lot of people come for the mild beautiful summers, fishing , gardening, whatever and then go down to AZ for the winter. Strangely, winter is my favorite time here but if I wasn't active and was elderly it would make sense.

My mom still lives in GA and has empty garage space so I'll be coming down in April to thrash the 240z and go to the Mitty then put it up again.

One of your pictures triggered a memory --

It made me think of a time I was cross country skiing in Russian Jack Park in Anchorage in the early 1990's

It was late in the afternoon (i.e. dark), snowing pretty good and I was just getting some exercise. They would pull the thing that puts tracks in the snow and I was just following those.

There was an unlit area with a gentle grade and I glanced up,  I didn't realize (at first) there was a moose was standing across the trail.

Cross country skis don't stop well.

As it dawned on me I was going to run into a moose if I kept going I paniced and sat down.

-- I might mention it was only my second or third time on cross country skis.

Fortunately I was still far enough away the moose didn't feel really threatened and kind of wandered off. Because I was sitting, strapped to skis, and kind of worn out the moose would have had no trouble stomping me into pulp.

I lived off Huffman south of Carrs, they had a little place in there with the best fired rice I have ever had.

Pheo! I have had several encounters like that at Far north and hilltop park. Round a bend and 1200 lbs of moose is there with a baby and wants to kick your ass. Super scary stuff.

Also the grocery store Chinese food. Alaska’s best Chinese is made at the grocery stores I’m convinced. That carr’s Does $5 Friday’s, and my bank has a branch in that shopping center. Quarterly I will schedule their training and it’s always on a Friday so I can get that ginger pork and fried rice. That’s hilarious you mentioned that since when I first moved here I remarked to my coworkers about the Chinese restaurants sucked but Carr’s and New Segaya were excellent.

This will be one of the last ski weekends for us since we are headed out of the country for a few weeks so I wanted to head up to the local ski spot that is also shared with the Army for training.

Pretty steep and slippery but it's doing just fine.

I've taken this picture before but not in a few years. It's definitely one of my favorite spots in winter.

As I was leaving I heard a whoooosh of air and it wouldn't idle anymore. After a quick inspections I notice the plug that was on the intake manifold for the EGR delete had blown off never to be found in the deep snow.

Solution to get home:

Search the back on the truck and find a tie rod fork and a heater hose. Gorilla tape it to the PS reservoir so it doesn't get munched in the pullies on the way home.

That was the most haggard roadside fix I've done in this thing. Literally nothing else would fit in there. After I got home I JB welded a brass cap fitting over the inlet and that should take care of it.

Old trucks are easy and cheap to fix but you are always messing with them. ;)

It's time to wrap this thread up for the old gal. I sold (or traded rather) the Land Cruiser for a pair of old British motorcycles this past weekend. The '73 Triumph Tiger with dual carbs from a Bonneville is a very clean runner that is fun to cruise around in and the '67 BSA 441 Victor Special is one of my favorite bikes of all time and so hard to find up here. The BSA has a recent engine build but I'm in the process of putting in a new Boyer ignition and clutch springs.  Riding a bike in AK isn't the most practical year round but for our short summer it's better than anywhere I've done it for sure.

I have a new Ecodiesel Ram with an honest to God bed, 4x4, and 3 times the fuel range of the 60 that we will be taking out for further trips this year.   

I may do another thread with the Ram or the bikes if anybody cares, otherwise have a great summer GRM! 

I'd love to see this adventure thread continue. My BIL has spent a lot of time there, Anchorage and Healy esp, but never shows us any pictures, the bastard. We'll get there someday.

Please make a thread with the RAM too!  Your pictures of the scenery up there are amazing.  And, I'm interested in the EcoDiesel too.

More please!!!!

Both of summer bikes and winter mopar!

Agreed on keeping up a thread for the adventures. I'm always interested when someone goes from an old, iconic vehicle to a new  vehicle how it compares. What's better? What's the same? What do you miss about the old one?

Plus your pics are fantastic.

Wow these pictures are amazing!! What camera did you use?

Anthony545 said:

Wow these pictures are amazing!! What camera did you use?

Iphone 6 for most of them! Haha

ultraclyde said:

Agreed on keeping up a thread for the adventures. I'm always interested when someone goes from an old, iconic vehicle to a new  vehicle how it compares. What's better? What's the same? What do you miss about the old one?

Plus your pics are fantastic.

Thanks, yeah to be honest with you the Ram does EVERYTHING "better" than the 60 did. Electronic rear locker,3 times the fuel range and double the MPG, 420 ft lbs of tq, push button transfer case, a real bed, air conditioning, a sound system, power windows, the list goes on and on but that being said I still loved the 60 for what it was. I'm just at a point where I needed an actual truck AND a newer vehicle instead of taking my wife's Prius for every drive out of town we weren't going to be on trails.

I still have my 240z in GA and now with old ass British motorcycles I have more things to vaporize my money and patience with locally.

I may get another FJ40 to use around the yard with a plow eventually but since i'm not fording rivers with a daily driver, I can certainly do all the same stuff with the Ram and do it better, beside being in a cool old Toyota (I'm ok with that)

The Ram is boring looking. Blends in, comfortable, turns on every time (For now, FCA I have my eye on you), and is just a regular old daily driver. It's EXCITING to start a carburetted 32 year old Land Cruiser in -37F and HOPE you can make it somewhere (I always did to be fair) but there is way less drama with this vehicle. The fact that there is less drama might make it more boring and not as interesting to see where it's going.

That was new. Since then I have added mud flaps, almost pieced together my Yakima roof rack (just need a fit kit Q7 for the mounting of the Q towers), and deleted the intake silencer for the choo choo noises.

I may just do the thread with the Ram and see how it goes and throw in random bike pictures too. Perhaps a mod could change the title of this thread to "Crankwalk explores AK just in general "